


Heavenfaced

by Quix



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Stannis FicArt Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-03
Updated: 2013-11-03
Packaged: 2017-12-31 08:51:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1029730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quix/pseuds/Quix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Stannis FicArt Week. Prompt: 'Stannis realises that Melisandre is beautiful but can’t decide if he cares or not. ASOS type time. Stannis/Melisandre'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heavenfaced

**Author's Note:**

> "I could walk out, but I won’t  
> In my mind I am in your arms  
> I wish someone would take my place  
> Can’t face heaven all heavenfaced"- 'Heavenfaced', The National

Dragonstone was no more beautiful by nightfall than day, a fortress of enchaining darkness and shadows forged by moonlight. The wind howled through the castles walls into the small hours of the morning, accompanied by the curling lashes of the raging sea and the downpour of rain against the surrounding cliffs. It was not beautiful, could never be so, something that was so inherently fearsome. To the Lord of Dragonstone, the two ideas seemed principal opposed to one another.

'The night is dark and full of terrors' a distant but familiar voice whispered in Stannis' ear, though he knew only he could hear it; a voice melodious and foreign and beautiful in its own way, not unlike its possessor. Melisandre was beautiful, he supposed, though he hardly considered himself conversant on the subject. He did not, he thought, even wholly understand the particulars of the idea. He vaguely recalled his mother once saying to him that beauty was worth only so much, that any truly honourable man (as she expected him to be) would recognise a lady's intelligence or kindness of spirit over the fairness of her face. He had not questioned her at the time (children were to respect the lessons of their parents, after all), though now he wondered how much truth there was to it. Men like his elder brother, depraved and foolish as Robert had been, seemed to care for little in regard to women other than how they appeared and whether or not he could lie with them. Certainly the red woman's appearance rarely escaped notice; half Stannis' knights were frightened to so much as speak her name, though few ever looked upon her in all her pale and red splendour without lingering in their gaze.

Yes, she was beautiful, but what did it matter, whether or not he considered her so? She was an advisor, a means, a weapon. She did not seem to care whether he or anyone else ever thought of her as beautiful, as he vaguely understood most other women to be so inclined. Did that mean she did not desire it though? Courtly courtesies, inane as they were, said a woman's beauty and grace was to be duly praised and flattered, even perhaps if it were non existent. He had never said as much to Lady Melisandre, there had never been a need for such frivolousness. Or perhaps the realisation of what he thought of her had simply been too recent.

It had not been an epiphany so much as it had seemed a mere passing thought, here in the resonating chamber of the painted table where but minutes (or had it been hours?) prior plans for the imminent departure North had been laid and thrown away and rewritten what seemed like a thousand pointless times. Most of his lords had left far from pleased, stunned and, most of them, disbelieving of the claims pronounced in the letter Davos had presented him, one that spoke of White Walkers and dead men rising from the Northern snows. Perhaps he had not even believed it himself at first, but Melisandre had. She had watched the dancing flames alight in the brazier, as she did now, all throughout the arguments, paying no mind to the squabbling of the lords around him, transfixed on whatever she saw within the fire other than smoke and ashes. 

He had not meant to allow himself to be so distracted. He had only glanced away from the plethora of charts and maps for a moment and caught sight of her profile, silhouetted against the blazing glow of the flames, a visage of red and fire and pale exquisiteness. The notion presented unassuming in his thoughts, as if it had always been there, thought to simply think of her as beautiful seemed almost wrongly crude. 

The thought remained, though he tried to ignore it.

Melisandre had not risen to follow the lords from the chamber as Stannis dismissed them. She did not so much as stir from her seated position, her body a figure of perfect stillness in her contemplation. 'What do you see?' begged mercilessly at the back of his mind, but the question remained unspoken; he had asked as much before to no more a definitive response than "much and more". He was not fool enough to think that she shared all of what she saw within the fires with him. Perhaps she thought he did not need to know, or that he simply would not wish to. A part of him resented that she might keep secrets from him, though he did not press it. They had come too far that he could ever not trust her now. 

He watched her for a time without constraint (though from a measured distance), considering the shape of her features and the clash of her scarlet hair as it brushed her meditative face, so pale that it almost seemed luminous of its own accords, a sight he couldn't help but think reminded him of a smear of blood on snow. He wondered faintly is she were aware of his unshifting gaze, and felt she must be. She often seemed attuned to him in a way that was at times unsettling, as if his thoughts to here were as simple to read as any book. 

She did not stir even as Stannis eventually approached, his footsteps seeming to resonate with unnatural weightiness as he stepped tentatively around the sculpted edge of the painted table. The air seems to warm as he neared, though he wasn't entirely sure if it was because of the brazier or simply her presence. He could not help the slight tremble in his hand as it reached to touch the contour of her shoulder, half-unaware of himself and his own movements, though as his fingers brushed the red material of her dress her body gave a slight tremor of its won, as if being suddenly roused from sleep. Melisandre did not turn to look at him, but laid a feverishly warm hand over his own, capturing it there.

"You should rest, my king." She spoke with a measured voice. "There is a war to fight."

He took half a step backward, though his hand remained where it was. His mind begged him to speak, though he knew not what to say. 'But will you fight with me?' He winced indadvertedly at that. Had he truly become so sentimental?

Eventually, he settled for: "Then so should you."

He hadn't meant it in invitation (or perhaps he simply didn't wish to admit he had), but he did not protest as she rose with an acquiescent nod and lead him from the room toward her own chambers. Nor did he resist as she stripped him of his outer mail and garments, periodically pressing slow, measured kisses to his jaw and neck. If there was holiness to fire, then so was there to the feel of her touch, to the burn of her blood coloured lips on his skin. Her beauty, however holy it may have been, would not make it any less of a sin, would not absolve him of his own weaknesses, but perhaps it was simply too late for that. He could never completely remove her from himself no more than he could extract the salt from the sea.

The words seemed to catch in his throat, nearly a whisper as he spoke them even in the quiet of her chambers. Of course, she has heard them before, he supposed; he surely is not the first man to tell her she is beautiful, and there was no reason hearing them from him should be any different from any other, but she smiled at him all the same and pressed another kiss to the edge of his mouth. Somehow it didn't seem like a thank you, but at least the words were not for nothing.


End file.
